As a professional photographer, photographing people for over 25 years, it has always been my goal that my portraits, business portraits, executive portraits, family portraits or headshots, whatever the purpose, illicit a genuine feeling from my subject and reveal their true selves. Their true inner beauty. Every person that I have photographed is beautiful. Every face is beautiful.
Then why are so many of us uncomfortable in front of the camera? WE choose to not have a good relationship with our appearance. We are the only ones capable of how we feel about our appearance, yet we all perceive the way the world sees us differently than they actually do. When in reality, they perceive us as BEAUTIFUL!
It has taken me years to come to this realization. That “I am beautiful”. For the majority of my adult life, and honestly my teen years as well, I was never told that I was beautiful. Even from the people in my life who I should have been able to count on the most. That took a huge toll on my self-esteem and how I thought people viewed me. I still struggle with it every day. But, I have made leaps and bounds in viewing myself differently.
So, if I feel this way, how many of my clients feel this way too? The last place I wanted to be was in front of the camera having my portrait taken. That’s why I’m behind it! LOL So I understand the uncomfortable feeling that many of the people who sit, or stand, in front of my lens feel. But I also see their beauty. And yes…there is beauty!
Beauty, by the way, relates to not only women but men as well. Beauty is, by definition, the quality present in a thing or person that gives intense pleasure or deep satisfaction to the mind, whether arising from sensory manifestations (as shape, color, sound, etc.), a meaningful design or pattern, or something else (as a personality in which high spiritual qualities are manifest).
We are all beautiful!
Peter Hurley and Anna Rowley gave a Ted Talks on the “psyphotology” of having your portrait taken. Maybe after viewing this you won’t be so reluctant to have your portrait taken. It is my hope that you will feel more at ease in front of the lens.
I’ve been told that one of the qualities that I have as a photographer is the ability to make my clients feel relaxed and comfortable in front of the camera. Let me capture YOU! The real beautiful amazing you!